NO BLOODSHED OR SLAUGHTER

Ancient Greece, more than any other culture or society in human history, has
come to be seen as the basis of Western civilization. According to Dr. T. Z.
Lavine: "It may be said that the Western world has had a long-standing love
affair with...Athens, as our ideal and model...than to any other city in all of
human history, except possibly Jerusalem. But we relate to Jerusalem not as an
ideal city, but only in devotion to the great persons who lived there and to the
sacred events that happened there.

"Why the long love affair with the ancient city of Athens? Athens is our
ideal as the first democracy, and as a city devoted to human excellence in mind
and body, to philosophy, the arts and science, and to the cultivation of the art
of living..." The ancient Greco-Roman civilization had a tradition of poets and
philosophers advocating moral and ethical consideration for animals – even to
the point of not eating them.

The Greek poet Hesiod (800 BC) espoused vegetarianism. In passages 109-201 of
Works and Days, he wrote that the first race of humans, the golden race, was
created by the gods of Olympus under the rule of Cronus. These humans were free
from sorrow, toil and grief. They did not have to labor for food: the earth
spontaneously gave them nourishment. Humans in the golden age were vegetarian.
Hesiod suggests that gods and men freely mixed, and even shared their meals
together. Death in this age was comparable to going to sleep.

This golden age of rule under Cronus eventually gave way to rule under Zeus.
A new race of silver men appeared. These were not descendants of the original
golden race, but a new creation. This race was foolish and impious, and did not
offer sacrifices to the gods. Zeus thus destroyed them and created a third race,
a race of bronze. The bronze race was fond of violence. They did not eat bread,
and they eventually destroyed each other.

The fourth race appeared in what was called the age of heroes. This age was
characterized by demigods who died in battle and were rewarded for their
heroism. The fifth and current race indicates the further deterioration of
humanity. This is the age of iron. It is a time of anxiety, toil, sorrow, war
and false pride. The human race in this age is described by Hesiod as the worst
of races, and he expressed the desire to have been born in an earlier age.

The centuries ahead, however, brought about a spiritual and intellectual
awakening across the globe. In Egypt, Pharaoh Necho caused Africa to be
circumnavigated. Zoroaster appeared in Persia, Confucius and Lao-Tzu in China,
the Hebrew prophets in Israel, and the Buddha in India. In Ionia, it was the
time of Thales, Anaximander and Pythagoras.

Pythagoras (570-470 BC) was born on the island colony of Samos. Secular
historian Dr. Martin A. Larson describes him as “A universal genius...He made
important contributions to music and astronomy; he was a metaphysician, a
natural philosopher, a social revolutionary, a political organizer, and the
universal theologian. He was one of those all-embracing intellects which appears
at rare intervals.”

Pythagoras’ biographer Diogenes Laertius records that he did not “neglect
medicine;” his followers contributed to medical wisdom. In the history of
religion, Pythagoras was the first person to teach the concepts of
reincarnation, heaven and hell to the Western world.

Diogenes Laertius writes that Pythagoras warned that all who did not accept
his teachings would suffer torment inn the afterlife, while promising his
followers the spiritual kingdom. According to the early Christian father
Eusebius: “Pythagoras...declared...that the doctrines which he had
received...were a personal revelation to himself from God.”

Pythagoras was driven from his native Samos in 529 BC when the tyrant
Polycrates declared him a subversive. He went to Croton in Italy, established a
school of philosophy, and lectured to classes of up to six hundred students. He
founded a monastic order that soon became very influential.

It was a religious sect made up of dedicated saints practicing vegetarianism,
voluntary poverty and chastity. In less than two decades, the Pythagoreans were
numerous and powerful enough to take political power without having to resort to
force or violence. History shows that when the Pythagoreans were attacked and
massacred in Magna Grecia in 450 BC, they practiced nonviolence and did not
resist their aggressors.

Ancient and modern historians alike acknowledge that Pythagoras was
vegetarian. This was the conclusion of Plutarch, Ovid, Diogenes Laertius and
Iamblichus in ancient times, and it is the conclusion of scholars today. Nor was
vegetarianism loosely connected with the Pythagorean philosophy – it was an
integral part of it.

“Oh, my fellow men!” exclaimed Pythagoras. “Do not defile your bodies with
sinful foods. We have corn. We have apples bending down the branches with their
weight, and grapes swelling on the vines. There are sweet flavored herbs and
vegetables which can be cooked and softened over the fire. Nor are you denied
milk or thyme-scented honey. The earth affords you a lavish supply of riches, of
innocent foods, and offers you banquets that involve no bloodshed or slaughter.”

Pythagoras' meals consisted of honeycomb, millet or barley bread, and
vegetables. He would pay fishermen to throw their catch back into the sea.
Ironically, he claimed to have been a fisherman in a previous life.

Pythagoras abhorred animal sacrifice and wine, and would only sacrifice
cakes, honey, and frankincense to the gods. He revered the altar at Delos
because it was free from blood sacrifices. Upon it, he offered flour, meal, and
cakes made without the use of fire. Pythagoras would not associate with cooks or
hunters.

According to Iamblichus, Pythagoras taught his followers not to kill even a
flea, especially in a temple. He not only showed respect for gods, humans, and
animals, but also for the trees, which were not to be destroyed, unless
absolutely necessary. It is said Pythagoras pet an eagle, told an ox not to
trample a bean field, and fed a ferocious bear barley and acorns, telling it not
to attack humans any more.

Pythagoras not only taught transmigration of the soul, or reincarnation, but
even claimed to remember his previous lives. It is said Pythagoras once stopped
a man from beating a dog, because in the dog's yelping he recognized the voice
of an old friend. For Pythagoras, killing animals for food meant causing
suffering or death to living creatures just as worthy of moral concern as human
beings, and who may also have been human in previous lifetimes.

"Our souls are immortal, and are ever received into new homes where they live
and dwell, when they have left their previous abode... All things change, but
nothing dies; the spirit wanders hither and thither, taking possession of what
limbs it pleases, passing from beasts into human beings, or again our human
spirit passes into beasts, but never at any time does it perish...

"Alas, what wickedness to swallow flesh into our own flesh, to fatten our
greedy bodies by cramming in other bodies, to have one living creature fed by
the death of another!"

If souls can transmigrate from one species to another, and all souls are of
the same nature, then the unnecessarily killing of animals is as morally
indefensible as the unnecessary killing of human beings.

Pythagoras may have also drawn a parallel between the plight of animals in
human hands, and the fate of humans in the hands of the gods. We humans would
suffer should the gods unnecessarily kill or torment us; we should likewise
treat the animal world with mercy.

Local tradition says Pythagoras spent time living in a cave on Mount Kerkis
in Samos. He was the first person in the history of the world to deduce that the
Earth is a sphere. He may have reached this conclusion by comparing the Earth to
the Sun and the Moon, or perhaps he noticed the curved shadow of the Earth upon
the Moon during a lunar eclipse, or he may have seen that when ships depart and
recede over the horizon, their masts disappear last.

The famous “Pythagorean theorem” is now known to have been mathematical
knowledge long before Pythagoras. Square roots and cube roots and the
“Pythagorean” theorem are mentioned in the Sulbha Sutras of Bodhayana, in India
(700BC). Bodhayana also calculated the areas of triangles, circles, trapezoids
and determined the value of pi as 3.14136 in measuring and constructing temple
altars. Some scholars believe Pythagoras may have received his wisdom from the
East.

What was significant about Pythagoras’ approach, however, was that he
developed a method of mathematical proof of the theorem, based on deduction. Our
modern tradition of mathematical proof, the basis for every kind of science,
originated in the West with Pythagoras.

Whereas classical Indian mathematics tended to be intuitive, the Greeks
established a tradition of rigorous mathematical proofs. Pythagoras further
taught that the world is well-ordered, harmonious, and may be comprehended
through human reason. He was the first to use the word “cosmos” to denote a
fathomable universe. According to Pythagoras, the laws of nature could be
deduced purely by thought.

During the Renaissance and the age of Enlightenment, Kepler and Newton
thought of the world in terms of harmony – the order and beauty of planetary
motion and the existence of mathematical laws explaining such motion, and from
them came our modern scientific belief that the entire universe can be measured,
quantified, and explained in terms of mathematical relationships.

These ideas all began with Pythagoras. “Chemistry is simply numbers,” said
Dr. Carl Sagan, “an idea Pythagoras would have liked.”

Pythagorean science was far more theoretical than experimental. However, one
of Pythagoras’ students, Alcmaeon, is the first person known to have dissected a
human body. He further identified arteries and veins, discovered the optic nerve
and the eustachian tubes, and declared the brain to be the seat of the
intellect.

This final contention was denied by Aristotle, who placed intelligence in the
heart. Alcmaeon also founded the science of embryology.

The Pythagoreans also contributed to medical ethics through the Oath of
Hippocrates. Hippocrates was a physician who lived in the 5th century BC. In a
treatise entitled "The Sacred Disease," he maintained that epilepsy and other
illnesses were not the result of evil spirits or angry gods, but due to natural
causes.

Hippocrates has been called the "Father of Medicine," the "wisest and
greatest practitioner of his art," and the "most important and most complete
medical personality of antiquity." Before Hippocrates, the physician studied
plants and animals and had a working knowledge of both harmful and beneficial
remedies. He could simultaneously heal some patients while killing others.

Hippocrates believed in the sanctity of life and called other physicians to
the highest ethical standards and conduct.

"Throughout the primitive world, the doctor and the sorcerer tended to be the
same person," observed anthropologist Margaret Mead. "He with the power to kill
had the power to cure, including especially the undoing of his own killing
activities. He who had the power to cure would necessarily also be able to
kill."

According to Mead, the Oath of Hippocrates marked a turning point in the
history of Western civilization because "for the first time in our tradition" it
caused "a complete separation between curing and killing.

"With the Greeks," concluded Dr. Mead, "the distinction was made clear. One
profession, the followers of Asclepius, were to be dedicated completely to life
under all circumstances, regardless of the rank, age, or intellect¬ – the life
of a slave, the life of the Emperor, the life of a foreign man, the life of a
defective child."

The United States Supreme Court in its Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, tried to
downplay the historical influence of the Oath of Hippocrates, by noting it
"echoes Pythagorean doctrines," and the Pythagoreans were a minority religion in
ancient Greece. The Oath reads:

"I swear by Apollo Physician, by Asclepius ... 1 will use treatment to help
the sick according to my ability and judgment, but never with a view to injury
and wrongdoing. Neither will I administer a poison to anybody when asked to do
so, nor will I suggest such a course. Similarly, I will not give to a woman a
pessary to cause abortion ... lnto whatsoever houses I enter, I will enter to
help the sick, and I will abstain from all intentional wrong-doing and harm,
especially from abusing the bodies of man or woman, bond or free."

Dr. Herbert Ratner observes: "Hippocrates' profound grasp of the nature of a
learned profession serving one of man's basic needs makes the Hippocratic Oath
one of the great documents and classics of man, a fact not only signified by its
universal inclusion in collections of the great books of Western civilization,
but by the universal veneration accorded it by physicians, singly and
collectively, throughout the ages ... the Oath, properly constituted, becomes
the one hope of preserving the unconfused role of the physician as healer."

American medical science consultant Dr. Andrew C. Ivy said, "The moral
imperative of the Oath of Hippocrates I believe is necessary for the survival of
the scientific and technical philosophy of medicine."

The Oath of Hippocrates and its modern equivalent, the Declaration of Geneva,
enacted by the World Medical Association in 1948, are frequently cited by the
American Medical Association in its prohibition against medical participation in
legally authorized executions. A code of conduct for physicians as healers, as
well as concern for the rights and well-being of the patient, originated with
Hippocrates and the Pythagorean tradition.

Despite these and many other outstanding contributions to ethics, medicine,
music, astronomy, geometry and general science, mathematics dominated
Pythagorean thought. The Pythagoreans were mathematicians as well as mystics.
Pythagoras taught that the laws of Nature could be deduced through logic and
reason.

The Pythagoreans delighted in the absolute certainty of mathematics, and
found in it a pure and undefiled realm accessible to the human intellect. They
believed that in mathematics they had glimpsed a perfect reality, a realm of the
gods, of which our own world is but an imperfect reflection.

Pythagorean theology was dualistic; it contrasted this corruptible, earthly
sphere with a pure and divine realm. One's higher nature, the eternal soul, is
entangled in temporal flesh. The body is like a tomb. The soul must not become a
slave to the body and its lusts. One must not fall prey to the demands of the
flesh.

Pythagoreanism exerted a profound influence upon Plato, and, later, Christian
theology. In Plato's famous parable of the cave, prisoners are tied to stakes so
they can only see shadows of passerby and believe the shadows to be real –
unaware of the higher reality that is accessible if they would simply turn their
heads.

The Pythagorean concept of a perfect and mystical world, unseen by the
senses, and inaccessible to flesh and blood was readily accepted by the early
Christians.

History tells us there were two classes of Pythagoreans. The akousmatikoi
heard the teachings of the Master and followed them to a degree, but were never
initiated into the deeper levels of mysticism. By contrast, the mathematikoi
were strict Pythagoreans, living as ascetics, and observing the holy way of life
taught by the Master.

Pythagoras established a monastic order at Croton that soon became a
vegetarian colony. After the massacre in Magna Grecia in 450 BC, the political
fortunes of the Pythaoreans declined. By 350 BC, Pythagoreanism had become more
of a religious sect than a philosophical school of thought. As a religion,
Pythagoreanism continued to attract spiritual seekers for over seven centuries.

Pythagorean thought was familiar to the leadership of the early Christian
church. The Christian father Justin Martyr wrote that when he was a youth
seeking spiritual enlightenment, he first went to the Pythagoreans. A
"celebrated" Pythagorean teacher told him, however, that before he could be
initiated into any kind of mysticism, he would first have to master music,
geometry and astronomy.

Discouraged, he turned to the Platonists. Their way of life may have been
equally demanding. Jesus' demands upon anyone wishing to become his disciple are
well-known. (Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 9:57-62, Luke 14:25-26, 33,
and Luke 18: 18-25) These did not deter Justin Martyr from eventually converting
to Christianity.

Although the Pythagoreans acknowledged the minor gods of the Greek pantheon,
they also recognized a Supreme Being. According to authorities within the early
Christian church, the Pythagoreans were monotheists: "God is one; and He is not
...outside of the frame of things, but within it; but, in all the entireness of
His being is in the whole circle of existence ... the mind and vital power of
the whole world," wrote Clement of Alexandria in Exhortation VI, quoting
Pythagoras.

The Pythagoreans espoused a pantheistic concept of God, recognizing His
omnipresent Spirit, but with no knowledge of His personal form – a concept which
the Stoics were to adopt. Like the Jews and the Zoroastrians, the Pythagoreans
consequently forbade the worship of images and statues.

First century Pythagorean ism is described in detail in The Life of
Apollonius of Tiana. The ancient texts records this neoplatonic philosopher and
miracle worker having a divine birth, absorbing the wisdom of Pythagoras,
practicing celibacy, vegetarianism, and voluntary poverty; healing the sick,
restoring sight to the blind, exorcising demons, foretelling the future, and
teaching the innermost secrets of religion. Finally, the text says he never
died, but went directly to heaven in a physical assumption.

The philosopher Empodocles (5th century BC) wrote that the ancients were much
more fortunate than modern man because they were vegetarian and there was
neither animal sacrifices nor war. He described humanity in previous ages using
statues, pictures, perfumes and honey in their worship.

The ancients did not offer animals, Empodocles maintained, because to kill an
animal for sacrifice or food is the greatest moral wrong. Empodocles described
these ancient races as gentle to animals and birds as well as to each other.

Empodocles was greatly influenced by Pythagorean doctrine. He believed in the
transmigration of souls:

"For I was once already boy and girl, Thicket and bird, and mute fish in the
waves All things doth Nature change, Enwrapping souls In unfamiliar tunics of
the flesh"

Because of reincarnation and the equality of all living beings, Empodocles
felt meat-eating was comparable to cannibalism. "Will ye not cease from this
great din of slaughter?" he once wrote. 'Will ye not see, unthinking as ye are,
how ye rend one another unbeknoweth?"

With a vision of eternal souls repeatedly being propelled by their carnal
desires into different bodies, life after life, Empodocles compared flesh-eating
to fathers unknowingly killing their sons, and children similarly killing their
parents:

"The father lifteth for the stroke of death His own dear son within a changed
form ... Each slits the throat and in his halls prepares A horrible repast. Thus
too the son Seizes the father, children the mother seize, And ... eat their own
dear flesh."

Belief in the golden age and vegetarianism existed outside the Pythagorean
tradition. The Cynic, Crates (4th century BC), wrote a poem linking nonviolence
to vegetarianism, and expressing the hope for a vegetarian utopia. Dicaerchus'
Life in Greece has been called the first cultural history of a people.
Dicaerchus, who lived in the late 4th century BC, did not believe in
reincarnation, the soul, or the afterlife. Nonetheless, he also wrote in favor
of ethical vegetarianism, insisting it is morally wrong to cause unnecessary
suffering to a being that can experience pain.

In her book, From Socrates to Sartre: the Philosophic Quest, Dr. T.Z. Lavine
writes:

"Plato is the most celebrated, honored and revered of all the philosophers of
the Western world. He lived in Athens ... in the fourth century before
Christ...He is said to be the greatest of the philosophers which Western
civilization has produced; he is said to be the father of Western philosophy;
the son of the god Apollo ...

"The British philosopher and mathematician Alfred North Whitehead said of him
that the history of Western philosophy is only a series of footnotes to Plato.
The American poet and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson said, 'Plato is
philosophy, and philosophy is Plato ... Out of Plato come all things that are
still written and debated among men of thought."

According to Diogenes Laertius, Plato (427-347 BC) began as a follower of
Socrates. After Socrates' death, he became the pupil of the leading Pythagoreans
of his day – Philolaus, Eurytas, Archytas, and others. Plato was also the
greatest collector of Pythagorean literature in antiquity.

Ovid attributed Plato's great longevity to his "moral purity, temperance, and
natural food diet of herbs, berries, nuts, grains and the wild plants ... which
the earth, the best of mothers, produces."

An economic link between flesh-eating and war can be found in Plato's
Republic. Plato records a dialogue between Socrates and Glaucon in which
Socrates extols the peace and happiness that come to people eating a vegetarian
diet. The citizens, Socrates says, will feast upon barley meal, wheat flour,
salt, olives, cheese, onions, greens, figs, chickpeas, beans, myrtle berries and
acorns.

These are the foods of peace and good health: "And with such a diet they may
be expected to live in peace and health to a good old age, and bequeath a
similar life to their children after them."

Glaucon does not believe people will be satisfied with such fare. He insists
that people will desire the "ordinary conveniences of life," including animal
flesh. He asks Socrates what foods would be eaten if he were not founding a
Republic but a city of pigs.

Anatomically, humans resemble the frugivores, but pigs are natural omnivores,
they can be made to eat even the flesh of their own kind, and they experience
inebriation on alcohol.

Socrates responds: "The true state I believe to be the one we have described
– the healthy state, as it were. But if it is your pleasure that we contemplate
also a fevered state, there is nothing to hinder."

Socrates then proceeds to stock the once ideal state with swineherds,
huntsmen, and "cattle in great number." The dialogue continues. Socrates asks
Glaucon:

"...and there will be animals of many other kinds, if people eat them?"

"Certainly."

"And living in this way we shall have much greater need of physicians than
before?"

"Much greater."

"And the country which was enough to support the original inhabitants will be
too small now, and not enough?"

"Quite true."

"Then a slice of our neighbor's land will be wanted by us for pasture and
tillage, and they will want a slice of ours, if, like ourselves, they exceed the
limit of necessity, and give themselves up to the unlimited accumulation of
wealth?"

"That, Socrates, will be inevitable."

"And so we shall go to war, Glaucon. Shall we not?"

"Most certainly," replies Glaucon.

Critics of Plato, reading the rest of the Republic, have complained that
Plato's "ideal" society is a militaristic or fascist state, with censorship and
a rigidly controlled economy.

Plato would hardly disagree with these critics; what they have failed to
observe is that the state which he describes is not his idea – it is merely a
result of Glaucon's demand for meat, which Socrates himself disavows.

Philosophy professor Daniel Dombrowski says, "That the Republic was to be a
vegetarian city is one of the best-kept secrets in the history of philosophy."
(Republic 369d-373e)

Plato also developed a theory that it would not be possible to have a just
and good society until kings were philosophers or until philosophers became
kings. In this way, the leaders would have a true understanding of justice and
virtue, and would be able to rule properly for the benefit of all the citizens.

According to Plato, the ideal society consists of three classes of men: the
governing class, the military class, and the mercantile class. Perhaps because
he lived in a slave state, Plato failed to recognize laborers as a fourth, or
working class.

However, Plato taught that people fall into different classes according to
their talents and abilities, rather than as a result of their birth. Plato
taught further that women are recognized as equals with men in the ideal
society, and may also become rulers, soldiers, or merchants.

In Plato's ideal state, the guardian (ruling) class and the military class
are trained to be just and virtuous. They must live like members of an ascetic
religious order. They have no worldly possessions or private property, nor do
they have any dealings with money. Sex and marriage in these classes exist
solely for the sake of procreation. They take their meals communally; the food
itself is simple, and consumed in moderation.

Plato infers that the guardian class, which consists entirely of
philosophers, should be vegetarian. In the Republic, he depicts what history
would be if philosophers of the golden age were to rule, and in the Statesman,
he describes the people of the golden age as vegetarian.

In the Statesman, the Eleatic Stranger, who is the hero of the dialogue,
describes an age similar to the creation account found in Genesis 1, in which:

"... God was supreme governor... So it befell that savagery was nowhere to be
found nor preying of creature on creature, nor did war rage nor any strife
whatsoever... they had fruits without stint from trees and bushes; these needed
no cultivation but sprang up of themselves out of the ground without man's
toil." (Statesman 271e, 272a)

According to Plato, vegetarianism was divinely ordained. In the Timaeus,
Plato says the gods created certain kinds of life to be our food:

"These are the trees and plants and seeds which have been improved by
cultivation and are now domesticated among us; anciently there were only the
wild kinds, which are older than the cultivated." (Timaeus 77a) These kinds of
life were especially created "to be food for us." (77c)

Plato also makes a passing reference to "the fruits of the earth or herb of
the field, which God planted to be our daily food." (80d)

Plato's writings contain frequent references to reincarnation. The souls of
animals and the souls of men are taught to be of equal worth. This is made clear
in the story of Er. (Republic 614-621) In this story, souls with human bodies
become animals in their next life, while souls clothed in animal bodies become
human.

Plato presented detailed accounts of reincarnation in many of his other
writings. (Phaedrus 248c; Phaedo 81-83, 85a; Meno 81b; Timaeus 90e-91c, etc.)
According to Plato, pure souls have fallen from the plane of absolute reality
because of sensual desire, and have taken on physical bodies.

First, the fallen souls are embodied in human forms. Of these, the highest is
that of the philosopher, who delights in higher knowledge, and lives on the
level of the mind, rather than the body. As long as he remains caught up in the
heavenly spheres, he returns to eternal life and existence. But if he becomes
entangled in carnal desires, he will descend into the animal kingdom.

Plato believed gluttons and drunkards could easily become asses in future
lifetimes, cruel and violent people may take birth as hawks or wolves, and blind
followers of social convention may be reborn as bees or ants. Eventually, the
soul will again receive another human body, and with it another opportunity to
seek first the spiritual kingdom, righteousness, and eternal life.

The early church historian Eusebius observed: "Plato, more than anyone else,
shared in the philosophy of Pythagoras." Early church father Justin Martyr is
known to have said repeatedly that Plato must have been versed in Christian
prophecy.

Aristotle (384-322 BC) was a student of Plato's who became a leading
philosopher with his own school of thought. Theophrastus, a student of
Aristotle, taught that grass was the most ancient kind of offering made to the
gods.

This was followed later by trees, and eventually fruits, barley,
frankincense, and so forth. The sacrifice of animals came much later. According
to Theophrastus, a vegetarian, this defiled the pure religion.

Porphyry (3rd century AD), wrote in his masterpiece De Abstentia that
Theophrastus regarded vegetarianism as a return to primeval perfection.
Theophrastus taught that the most ancient libations were performed with
sobriety. Water was initially offered, and only in later times did the offerings
consist of honey, oil, and wine.

According to Plato, the ideal society consists of three classes of men: the
governing class, the military class, and the mercantile class. Perhaps because
he lived in a slave state, Plato failed to recognize laborers as a fourth, or
working class.

However, Plato taught that people fall into different classes according to
their talents and abilities, rather than as a result of their birth. Plato
taught further that women are recognized as equals with men in the ideal
society, and may also become rulers, soldiers, or merchants.

In Plato's ideal state, the guardian (ruling) class and the military class
are trained to be just and virtuous. They must live like members of an ascetic
religious order. They have no worldly possessions or private property, nor do
they have any dealings with money. Sex and marriage in these classes exist
solely for the sake of procreation. They take their meals communally, the food
itself is simple, and consumed in moderation.

Plato infers that the guardian class, which consists entirely of
philosophers, should be vegetarian. In the Republic, he depicts what history
would be if philosophers of the golden age were to rule, and in the Statesman,
he describes the people of the golden age as vegetarian.

In the Statesman, the Eleatic Stranger, who is the hero of the dialogue,
describes an age similar to the creation account found in Genesis 1, in which:

"...God was supreme governor...So it befell that savagery was nowhere to be
found nor preying of creature on creature, nor did war rage nor any strife
whatsoever...they had fruits without stint from trees and bushes; these needed
no cultivation but sprang up of themselves out of the ground without man's
toil." (Statesman 271e, 272a)

According to Plato, vegetarianism was divinely ordained. In the Timaeus,
Plato says the gods created certain kinds of life to be our food:

"These are the trees and plants and seeds which have been improved by
cultivation and are now domesticated among us; anciently there were only the
wild kinds, which are older than the cultivated." (Timaeus 77a) These kinds of
life were especially created "to be food for us." (77c)

Plato also makes a passing reference to "the fruits of the earth or herb of
the field, which God planted to be our daily food." (80d) Plato's writings
contain frequent references to reincarnation. The souls of animals and the souls
of men are taught to be of equal worth. This is made clear in the story of Er.
(Republic 614-621) In this story, souls with human bodies become animals in
their next life, while souls clothed in animal bodies become human.

Plato presented detailed accounts of reincarnation in many of his other
writings. (Phaedrus 248c; Phaedo 81-83, 85a; Meno 81b; Timaeus 90e-91c, etc.)
According to Plato, pure souls have fallen from the plane of absolute reality
because of sensual desire, and have taken on physical bodies.

First, the fallen souls are embodied in human forms. Of these, the highest is
that of the philosopher, who delights in higher knowledge, and lives on the
level of the mind, rather than the body. As long as he remains caught up in the
heavenly spheres, he returns to eternal life and existence. But if he becomes
entangled in carnal desires, he will descend into the animal kingdom.

Plato believed gluttons and drunkards could easily become asses in future
lifetimes, cruel and violent people may take birth as hawks or wolves, and blind
followers of social convention may be reborn as bees or ants. Eventually, the
soul will again receive another human body, and with it another opportunity to
seek first the spiritual kingdom, righteousness, and eternal life.

The early church historian Eusebius observed: "Plato, more than anyone else,
shared in the philosophy of Pythagoras." Early church father Justin Martyr is
known to have said repeatedly that Plato must have been versed in Christian
prophecy.

Aristotle (384-322 BC) was a student of Plato's who became a leading
philosopher with his own school of thought. Theophrastus, a student of
Aristotle, taught that grass was the most ancient kind of offering made to the
gods.

This was followed later by trees, and eventually fruits, barley,
frankincense, and so forth. The sacrifice of animals came much later. According
to Theophrastus, a vegetarian, this defiled the pure religion.

Porphyry (3rd century AD), wrote in his masterpiece De Abstentia that
Theophrastus regarded vegetarianism as a return to primeval perfection.
Theophrastus taught that the most ancient libations were performed with
sobriety. Water was initially offered, and only in later times did the offerings
consist of honey, oil, and wine.

When animal sacrifices began, not only did meat-eating become widespread, but
so did atheism, as a reaction against the anger of the gods for deliberately
killing animals. (De Abstentia 2:7,20,32)

Theophrastus also regarded vegetarianism as a matter of ethics. To kill
animals unnecessarily is unjust. (De Abstentia 2: 11-12) He suggested that war,
pestilence and damaged crops may have caused humans to start killing animals for
food, but in a world where fruits, grains, nuts, and vegetables are in
abundance, there is no need to sacrifice or eat animals. Besides, he insisted,
the gods consider the products of the soil to be the most beautiful and
honorable gifts.

Diogenes Laertius recorded that Theophrastus wrote several books on animals.
Theophrastus has been called the "father of ecology." He conducted the most
extensive studies of plants in antiquity.

More than any other Greek philosopher, Theophrastus understood the difference
between plants and animals, especially with regard to conscious awareness and
suffering. He taught that piety and justice require us to refrain from harming
others whenever we can. And animals can be harmed, whereas plants cannot. He
observed that animals are capable of passion, perception and reason.

Humanism was gradually replacing mysticism. During the 1st century BC,
Diodorus Siculus wrote his universal history of the world. Dismissing the idea
of a golden age, he wrote that the first humans were vegetarians learning to
cope with the elements. According to Siculus, humans in the beginning enjoyed
neither peace nor bliss. They were brutish, undisciplined, and attacked by wild
animals.

Plutarch (45-125 AD) was a Greek priest at Delphi. This gave him access to
Greece's most ancient traditions. Plutarch was one of the few writers in the
ancient world to advocate vegetarianism solely out of compassion for animals
without referring to reincarnation.

His essay, "On Eating Flesh," is a thought-provoking literary classic:

"Can you really ask what reason Pythagoras had for abstinence from flesh?" he
began. "For my part I rather wonder both by what accident and in what state of
mind the first man touched his mouth to gore and brought his lips to the flesh
of a dead creature, set forth tables of dead, stale bodies, and ventured to call
food and nourishment the parts that had before bellowed and cried, moved and
lived.

"How could eyes endure the slaughter when throats were slit and hides flayed
and limbs torn from limb? How could his nose endure the stench? How was it that
the pollution did not turn away his taste, which made contact with sores of
others and sucked juices and serums from mortal wounds?

"It is certainly not lions or wolves that we eat out of self-defense; on the
contrary, we ignore these and slaughter harmless, tame creatures without stings
or teeth to harm us For the sake of flesh we deprive them of sun, of light, of
the duration of life to which they are entitled by birth and being."

Plutarch then delivered his challenge to the flesh-eaters:

"If you declare that you are naturally designed for such a diet, then first
kill yourself what you want to eat. Do it, however, only through your own
resources, unaided by cleaver or cudgel or any kind of ax."

Plutarch observed that the first man put to death in Athens was the most
degraded amongst knaves, but eventually the philosopher Polemarchus (what to
speak of Socrates) was put to death as well.

He concluded that killing animals, whether human or otherwise, is a
bloodthirsty and savage practice which only serves to incline the mind towards
more brutality. His argument appears to link the needless slaughter of animals
to capital punishment.

During the 3rd century AD, Porphyry made allusions to the golden age in De
Abstentia. Porphyry was a disciple of Plotinus (205-270 AD), a neoplatonic
philosopher who was renowned for his wisdom, asceticism, and deep spirituality.
Plotinus acknowledged the reality of transmigration of souls and the equality of
all living creatures. A celibate vegetarian, he would not consume even medicines
which contained animal products.

Like his teacher Plotinus, Porphyry was vegetarian. He wrote De Abstentia, or
On Abstinence (From Eating Animal Flesh) to another disciple, Firmus Castricius,
who had abandoned his spiritual discipline or regimen, which included the
practice or observance of vegetarianism.

Porphyry provided every possible reason why Firmus should remain vegetarian.
His work is divided into four separate books, each focusing on a different
aspect of vegetarianism.

Porphyry wrote that before animal sacrifice began, the human race abstained
from eating animals altogether. (De Abstentia 2:10) Humans originally sacrificed
grass. When widespread famine occurred, animals were offered to placate the
gods. This was unnecessary. Like the commentary on the biblical story of Cain
and Abel found in the New Testament (Hebrews 11:4), the gods are more pleased
with the faith of the worshippers than with the object of sacrifice.

Porphyry depicted humanity in a state of gradual decline since the golden
age. All sacrifices in the golden age were "simple, pure, and bloodless."

The degeneration of mankind began with the shedding of blood. However, even
after men began to kill animals, they still protected animals which were
domesticated and working cooperatively with humans.

Porphyry wrote that the moral degeneration of man will continue to the point
of cannibalism, but go no further. (2:31, 53)

Many of Porphyry's arguments in favor of animal rights from the 3rd century
AD are surprisingly modern and resonate with present-day animal activists.

According to Porphyry, animals have rights. Animals are our brothers and
sisters. Animals have been endowed with life, feelings, ideas, memory, and
industry. The only thing animals may be said to lack which sets humans apart
from them is the gift of speech. "If they had it," asked Porphyry, "should we
dare to kill and eat them? Should we dare to commit these fratricides?"

Porphyry further observed that, in reality, animals do possess language,
which the ancients were said to have understood. The birds and beasts
communicate, but men no longer understand their language. Animals not only
think, feel, and suffer; they learn to understand human language.

Men may not understand foreigners, but that does not make them irrational
brutes. Moreover, it is absurd to say animals lack reason when we admit that
dogs, elephants, and many other animals can depart from reason – i.e., go mad.

In De Abstentia, Porphyry also dealt with Greek vegetarianism and its
relationship to other ancient cultures. He wrote favorably of Egyptian priests,
Persian Magi (Zoroastrians), the life of the Spartans as recorded by Lycurgus,
the Jews, the Essenes, the brahmana priests of India, the Buddhists, and other
traditions where religious vegetarianism has been observed. The Greeks called
the holy teachers of India Gymnosophists. Porphyry described the fertile Ganges
region as a paradise – as if the golden age still existed in other parts of the
world.